Gentle Grace
Proper
9 Year A
9
July 2017 8 a.m. Said and 10:00 a.m. Sung Holy Eucharist
Parish
Church of Trinity Ashland (Oregon)
Paul in
today’s epistle says, “I do not understand my own actions. For I
do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate” (Romans 7:15). He is
expressing an experience that most of us have at one time or another: wanting two different things, each mutually
exclusive; not completely knowing our own mind. Being torn by competing desires, by fears and
doubts, is one of the great obstacles to our connecting with God. As the letter of James has it: “If any of you is lacking wisdom, just ask
God. God gives to all generously and
ungrudgingly, and he will give you what you ask. But remember, you must do this with complete
trust, free of fear or doubt. The one
who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed about by the wind. The fear-filled person is double-minded and
unstable in every way. Such a one cannot
expect to receive anything from God” (James 1:5-7). It is
because of this that Jesus teaches “blessed are the single minded—they shall
see God.”
C.S. Lewis put
it succinctly in his retelling of the myth of Psyche and Eros: “[God]
cannot meet us face to face until we have
faces.”
This division within our minds and
wills, this fuzziness of what we want, the contradictions between our competing
desires are often put into metaphorical form by that image we know from the
cartoons: a little angel sitting on one of our shoulders arguing with a little
devil sitting on the other one, both of them looking like us, but one with
halo, wings, and harp, and the other with horns, tail, and a pitchfork. The image, as laughable as it is, comes a
very real experience in our hearts. Sometimes our competing desires are so
acutely at odds with each other and we are so conflicted that it feels like we
are actually in the middle of an argument apart from us, that we are being
enticed by different personalities rather than simply arguing with ourselves or
being indecisive. This feeling, I
believe, is where the ancient tradition of personifying a tempter, a devil, or
a Satan, actually came from.
St. Paul describes the problem in
detail: I don’t really know who I am or
what I really want. I decide to do some
good thing, and then fail to do it. I
make a resolve to avoid some bad thing, and then find myself in the act. The fact that I cannot really make up my
mind, or that I change my mind, shows how important it is to have objective
standards, a written Law: “If I do the very thing I do not want to do, I by
that fact agree that the Law is good!” Paul goes on to describe his inner
inconsistency and experience of obsession or compulsion almost as if he is
divided or split: a Law of Sin in his members at war with a Law of God in his
mind. A little more abstract, perhaps,
but basically: a little devil Paul on one shoulder and a little angel Paul on
the other.
This passage is often misread. St. Augustine and then later Martin Luther
took it in light of their own personal sense of guilt in struggles with sin,
and thought Paul was talking about same guilt-ridden introspective conscience
through which they saw the world. Thus
the great division between Law and Grace in Protestant theology arose. But Paul elsewhere shows that he is perfectly
happy in saying that he is “blameless” in keeping the Law, and “righteous” in
the works it requires. Paul is no
lust-haunted Augustine or guilt-ridden Luther.
He simply is describing how hard it is to know who we are and what we
want given how changeable and double-minded we are. And he sees this as an intolerable burden,
because it not only separates us from God, but alienates us from others and
from our very selves. This struggle,
what he calls “this body of death,” makes it hard even to know who we really
are. Who will deliver us from it, he
asks. Jesus Christ is his answer.
The Gospel today also speaks of conflicting desires. The same critics had condemned John the Baptist and Jesus: John for being too conservative and austere and Jesus for being too welcoming and liberal. Jesus rebukes these critics. He quotes a popular proverb and compares them to naughty children in the marketplace who cannot be satisfied with anything because of their conflicting desires. They taunt each other: little girls tease the boys who want to dance and play music which men used in wedding celebrations; little boys tease the girls because they want to practice the mourning songs and ululations women sing at funerals. You can’t have it both ways, says Jesus. “Wisdom is vindicated by her deeds,” he concludes, “you won’t have contradictory desires if you are integrated and truly find yourselves.” Then Matthew adds that saying that sounds so much more like the Gospel of John than it does any synoptic: the Father has given all things to the Son. The point is that in Jesus, there are no self-contradictions, no competing desires, no alienation from God, others, or one’s self. So Jesus ends the passage by telling us, basically, to “drop the rock.” He offers to take on our burdens for us if we work along side of him and learn from him. The Message, a modern paraphrase translation of the Bible, puts it this way:
“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on
religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show
you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it.
Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting
on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”
We are a sorry lot, whether we have
active addictions recognized by others or not.
We all are subject to obsession and compulsion at times, and all carry
heavy burdens created from all our conflicting desires, hopes, and fears. And God cannot really talk to us face to
face until we begin to develop faces that are truly our own, hearts that hold
our real desires. It is by taking on
Jesus’ yoke, taking on his task of announcing the kingdom in word and deed and
healing the broken world, walking with him and working with him, that we begin
to learn from him who we each really are and what we truly desire. It is not something forced, regimented, or
produced by a technique. It is not the
result of willing it, or submitting to some standard. We let go, and let
God work his gentle grace. Our new self
distills like the dew in the morning.
Losing our false desires is like finally removing the pebble from our
shoe. It is like, in the middle of the
summer heat, taking off a heavy winter coat. It is wonderful.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
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